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Page 15
IV. THE PYRAMID
And so at different points along the road are the different arts,
saying what they are best able to say, and in the language which
is peculiarly their own. Despite, or perhaps thanks to, the
differences between them, there has never been a time when the
arts approached each other more nearly than they do today, in
this later phase of spiritual development.
In each manifestation is the seed of a striving towards the
abstract, the non-material. Consciously or unconsciously they are
obeying Socrates' command--Know thyself. Consciously or
unconsciously artists are studying and proving their material,
setting in the balance the spiritual value of those elements,
with which it is their several privilege to work.
And the natural result of this striving is that the various arts
are drawing together. They are finding in Music the best teacher.
With few exceptions music has been for some centuries the art
which has devoted itself not to the reproduction of natural
phenomena, but rather to the expression of the artist's soul, in
musical sound.
A painter, who finds no satisfaction in mere representation,
however artistic, in his longing to express his inner life,
cannot but envy the ease with which music, the most non-material
of the arts today, achieves this end. He naturally seeks to apply
the methods of music to his own art. And from this results that
modern desire for rhythm in painting, for mathematical, abstract
construction, for repeated notes of colour, for setting colour in
motion.
This borrowing of method by one art from another, can only be
truly successful when the application of the borrowed methods is
not superficial but fundamental. One art must learn first how
another uses its methods, so that the methods may afterwards be
applied to the borrower's art from the beginning, and suitably.
The artist must not forget that in him lies the power of true
application of every method, but that that power must be
developed.
In manipulation of form music can achieve results which are
beyond the reach of painting. On the other hand, painting is
ahead of music in several particulars. Music, for example, has at
its disposal duration of time; while painting can present to the
spectator the whole content of its message at one moment.
[Footnote: These statements of difference are, of course,
relative; for music can on occasions dispense with extension of
time, and painting make use of it.] Music, which is outwardly
unfettered by nature, needs no definite form for its expression.
[Footnote: How miserably music fails when attempting to express
material appearances is proved by the affected absurdity of
programme music. Quite lately such experiments have been made.
The imitation in sound of croaking frogs, of farmyard noises, of
household duties, makes an excellent music hall turn and is
amusing enough. But in serious music such attempts are merely
warnings against any imitation of nature. Nature has her own
language, and a powerful one; this language cannot be imitated.
The sound of a farmyard in music is never successfully
reproduced, and is unnecessary waste of time. The Stimmung of
nature can be imparted by every art, not, however, by imitation,
but by the artistic divination of its inner spirit.]
Painting today is almost exclusively concerned with the
reproduction of natural forms and phenomena. Her business is now
to test her strength and methods, to know herself as music has
done for a long time, and then to use her powers to a truly
artistic end.
And so the arts are encroaching one upon another, and from a
proper use of this encroachment will rise the art that is truly
monumental. Every man who steeps himself in the spiritual
possibilities of his art is a valuable helper in the building of
the spiritual pyramid which will some day reach to heaven.
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